A highly specialized Office for monitoring, analyzing, processing and reporting online paedophilia is to work alongside the New Centre for Child Protection established by Institute of Psychology at the Pontifical Gregorian University.The Office is called Osmocop, and as Linda Bordoni reports, it was launched on Tuesday morning during a press conference at Vatican Radio.
Just a couple of days after the closing of the symposium for bishops and religious superiors on sexual abuse, and the launch of an e-learning center for child protection based in Munich, Vatican Radio’s general director, father Federico Lombardi, played host to the Italian Associazione Meter that presented its annual report, and illustrated a new World Observatory against Paedophilia called Osmocop.
The founder of the association, don Fortunato Di Noto, is well known for his tireless work informing civil and judicial authorities on the presence of criminal organizations on Internet, and for the support and counselling his association offers to victims of paedophilia.
Osmocop – he says - offers a substantial and important contribution to the fight against the scourge of online paedophilia, which is escalating alarmingly as demonstrated by Meter’s annual report.
This, thanks also to the collaboration of experienced professionals in fields of technology and psychology who are able to identify and evaluate criminal paedophilia organizations and individuals.
As father Di Noto explained, it processes streams of data from the internet, it collects and receives reports from users browsing the web, and any sites or domains with content deemed harmful to minors are immediately be forwarded to the police.
Osmocop also aims to educate people on how to monitor and report suspicious sites, to raise awareness and to promote the proper use of the internet by minors.